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Â What makes a party feel like a party? Is it the music? the people? the food? alcohol? It's hard to say really, but when the right ingredients are mixed with the right atmosphere, it comes alive and becomes an unforgettable experience. All a host can do is make sure the right atmosphere and ingredients are in place and hope for the best.

As it turns out, the same is true for online communities. The job of the community host is to set the stage for community to develop - to combine the right ingredients with right atmosphere. If the conditions are right - an engaged and successful community may develop over time.

Curiously, hosting parties and online communities share a lot of consistencies. In both cases, there are timeless ingredients that work together to create an environment that leads to success. Here are 12 ingredients that go into having a great party or hosting a successful online community:

1. Your party needs a reason to celebrate.The best parties are for a special occasion, a birthday, a holiday, an announcement.Members want to come together for a purpose, a shared interest or common experience.Otherwise, why have a party

Online communities need a focus or purpose. If your community doesn't serve a need or have a purpose, why would people show up? If your purpose is defined, make it obvious to new members. Think about setting goals and tracking progress towards a shared goal. But, don't be one-dimensional consider related subjects and resources.

2. Your party needs good planning.Nothing kills a party like running out of food or alcohol. A party with too little food is a tragedy that could have been averted with good planning.Too much is better than not enough.Plan well.

Online communities have the potential to grow exponentially.Make sure the technology and the people involved are prepared to handle growth. Be flexible and prepare for the community to have an influence on future plans. Target specific kinds of people you'd like as members. Define and redefine success as needed.

3. Your party needs a place.If people are going to interact, they need a home of some sort.Members need to know where the party is happening and what they can bring.It helps if the place is well kept, easy to use and looks familiar.

Online communities need a web site that serves as the community's home. Start small and build the site's structure based on the member's needs. Plan for skyscrapers, but start with apartments. The community should feel like home for your target members.

4.Your party needs a host. The party's host is the glue that holds everything together. They donâ€™t have to be the center of attention, but they do have to be there to tell people where to find the restroom and when the food is ready. They orchestrate and organize.

Online communities needs a community manager or host to serve as the touchstone of the community. Good hosts are active members of the community and constantly engaged. They work with the site's designers and developers. They protect the community and advocate for it's members. They are accountable to members and the site's owners. They provide balance.

5. Your party needs basic rules.Most rules are common sense and barely need repeating (don't feed beer to the dog!), but some provide members with a way to know what sort of party it is. Are kids allowed? Can we bring something? Should we dress in costume?

Online communities need guidelines. Guidelines enable the community to have set expectations about their participation. These are not the Terms of Service, but rules of the road - dos and don'ts. The best guidelines are written in plain language and in a personal tone. Fun helps too!

6. Your party needs a bouncer.Parties are famous for bringing out the best and worst in people.A few unruly folks can ruin everyoneâ€™s fun.Sometimes the host has to enforce the rules and kick a few people out to improve everyone's experience.

Online communities need someone who is empowered to remove or deal with members who threaten the community's culture or standards. Trolls, spammers and other miscreants can be toxic to a community and the role of the bouncer is to deal with them in a responsible manner,. Guidelines and Terms of Service often help with enforcement. Enable your members to identify the problem members.

7. Your party needs an invitation.How else is anyone going to know about it?

Online communities need ways to create awareness. Give members badges that they can put on their blogs. Give them ways to invite their friends. If the community is connected to a business, work with marketing to ensure that customers are aware it exists. Prompt members to blog about it, consider word-of-mouth.

8. Your party needs a few introductions.â€œHello My Name Isâ€?? tags are not a bad idea.Give people a way to find people like them and interact around something in common. Games can be a great ice breaker.

Online communities depend on member profiles that reflect interest, activity and needs.Make sure the profile fits with the community. Consider the highly developed profiles on social networking sites. Also, provide a safe place for new members to introduce themselves to the community.

9. Your party needs an event.Maybe itâ€™s a toast, or a movie or a limbo contest, but it helps to bring people together around a mid-party event.Get people out of their seats and inspire them to get involved.

Online communities thrive on connection. Connections are made stronger through face-to-face meetings and specific events that offer members a chance to come together around something specific and timely.Have a contest or a special event online.Invite a special guest, mix it up, make it new.

10. Your party needs a way for the attendees to pitch-in.People love to party, but partying can be messy and they want to do their part to help clean up.They wonâ€™t mind, ask them to help do the dishes or take out the trash.

Online communities can be mobilized.Let them pitch in and help solve a problem. Be prepared to share your needs and ask for help. The members can help you organize the site through tags or ratings. They can help you manage content through reporting inappropriate behavior. They can lobby their congressman on your behalf. They want to help â€“ give them a chance.

11.Your party needs multiple ways to participate.The best parties appeal to different types of people.If tequila shots are the only way to party, people will not feel comfortable.You might find that people want to play Jenga or run the video camera.Make these options available and let them find their thing.

Online community participation options have grown.Community doesnâ€™t have to be about discussion. Let members start a blog, add tags to content, edit a wiki page or vote on a photo. Consider options to â€œadd as friendâ€?? or â€œjoin this groupâ€?? like social networking sites. Consider how small modes of participation can be a gateway to deeper contributions.

12. Your party needs variety.A party of complete strangers can have difficulty getting rolling.The best parties are a mix of old friends and new friends.Often, the old friends have social status in the group and serve to bring the new folks into the fray.The old friends set the tone and serve as an example for others.

Online communities need a means of expressing and perceiving social status.Enable members to display a measure of their experience or reputation based on participation, length of membership, ratings by fellow members or a combination of factors. This gives new members context and helps build trust. Members need veteran members to use as positive examples.

Conclusion: In the end, if you're truly interested in online communities, the most important ingredient is you. Without people who care about the community and are willing and excited about making it work, it will not succeed.

My hope is that these points have given you some things to consider in turning your passion into a reality. If you're having a party or building an online community, please let me know - I'll come!

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In this Information Week article , Cory Doctorow, author and co-editor of Boing Boing takes a look at how to deal with trolls - people that are toxic to communities due to their aggressiveness and persistent poor behavior.

True to form, Cory uses a geeky radiological metaphor to explain the tactics...

Discussion groups are like uranium: a little pile gives off a nice, warm glow, but if the pile gets bigger, it hits critical mass and starts a deadly meltdown. There are only three ways to prevent this: Make the pile smaller again, spread the rods apart, or twiddle them to keep the heat convecting through them.

In the end, there are no easy answers. Cory reviews technical (ratings), non-technical (contacting the person) and a combination (disemvowelling and troll whispering - you have to read the article). What is clear is that communities need active management and people who can work with the group, using multiple means, before complete meltdown occurs.

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May 14, 2007

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leelefever

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Wow, interesting things from community people are just rolling off the presses lately. Derek Powazek is leaving JPG Magazine and 8020 Publishing (the companies he founded) - due to a disagreement with the partners. It's so sad to see someone work so hard and be so passionate about a community project only to see it controlled by someone else. His passion made it successful, just like Matt Haughey at MetaFilter.

JPG Magazine is one of the community-based businesses that I cite most. It's a real-world photography magazine that is made of contributions from the community. The community creates the photos and votes for them to appear in the magazine. A well crafted community mobilization strategy if there ever was one.

Derek's explanation of the situation is a case study in how partnerships can go wrong - and serves as his way of saying goodbye to the community he developed over three years. If you're an entrepenuer, go read it now.

If itâ€™s any help to other entrepreneurs, hereâ€™s what Iâ€™ve learned.

Make no assumptions when it comes to roles and responsibilities. Like my dad says: â€œSomeoneâ€™s gotta call quittinâ€™ time.â€??

Communication between partners is mandatory. And you cannot communicate with someone who is not communicating with you.

Decisions arenâ€™t decisions if you have to keep making them. Set on the course and stick to it. If you keep talking about things that have already been decided, nothing will ever get done.

When someone says one thing, but acts in a contradictory way, you have a choice between believing their words or believing their deeds. Believe their deeds.

Never let anyone tell you what you want. When someone says, â€œYou donâ€™t want that,â€?? what they really mean is, â€œI donâ€™t want you to have that.â€??

Donâ€™t stay where youâ€™re not wanted, respected, or happy. Even if itâ€™s your company.

Derek is a long-time community professional - he wrote a book called Design for Community in 2001 and has been a champion in the community world for longer than that. His wife, Heather Champ is the community manager at Flickr and collaborator on JPG too. I wish them both the best as I'm sure this is not the best of their days. I'm sure they will be on to greener pasture soon enough.

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May 14, 2007

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leelefever

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Matt Haughey knows community. He is the founder of MetaFilter, a very popular community site that is based on enabling members to blog about stories that are important to them. It's a real success story in the community world and I consider Matt one of it's real innovators.

He recently started a new blog call fortuito.us where he is hoping to post an article a week on his experiences. His most recent post is Some Community Tips for 2007, which serves as an interesting review of the things he feels are important in making MetaFilter successful. I encourage you to go read the whole post.

The major points are:

Take emotion out of decisions (be patient and don't make rash decisions about members)

Talk like a human, not a robot

Give people something they can be proud of (enable them to customize their profile and experience)

Bring users in during community decisions

Moderation is a full time job

Metrics spread out the work

Guidelines not rules

One of Matt's quotes stuck with me:

If you're building a community you have to love what you're doing and be the best member of it. It takes great care and patience to create a space others will share and you have to nurture it and reward your best contributors. It's a decidedly human endeavor with few, if any, technical shortcuts.

This is an important point for businesses that are considering community: passion matters. You can have support from the CEO, the best software and the coolest design, but if there isn't a passionate and engaged person (or team) keeping the community rolling, your goals for the community may not be reached.

How do you identify these people? There may already be people in your company who are passionate about community, but this fact never appears on their job description.

Do any of your employees blog (personally or otherwise)?

Do some employees who have big ideas for the company web site, but never seem to get support?

Have you asked your employees about their online community activities/experiences outside of work?

These questions may help you find these people. Talk to them, give them a chance to have an influence and you may find that your company already has experienced and passionate community leaders.

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May 14, 2007

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leelefever

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Wow. Josh pointed me to some of the rather strange goings on at Digg - a site where members control the headlines by promoting their favorite news stories. Apparently the site has been a hub for sharing the encryption code that can be used to access HD/DVDs. Digg received a cease and desist letter and tried to remove the offending links from Digg at the risk of being sued.

Weâ€™ve been notified by the owners of this intellectual property that they believe the posting of the encryption key infringes their intellectual property rights. In order to respect these rights and to comply with the law, we have removed postings of the key that have been brought to our attention.

The problem is, they couldn't really keep up with the community who was hell-bent on sharing it. The community kept digging the code no matter what they did. They were stuck with users in revolt.

today was a difficult day for us. We had to decide whether to remove stories containing a single code based on a cease and desist declaration. We had to make a call, and in our desire to avoid a scenario where Digg would be interrupted or shut down, we decided to comply and remove the stories with the code.

But now, after seeing hundreds of stories and reading thousands of comments, youâ€™ve made it clear. Youâ€™d rather see Digg go down fighting than bow down to a bigger company. We hear you, and effective immediately we wonâ€™t delete stories or comments containing the code and will deal with whatever the consequences might be.

If we lose, then what the hell, at least we died trying.

I respect Kevin and Digg for taking a stand - especially a stand that the community is demanding that they take. Though, I'm not sure they have a choice, really. They know their users and if Digg is seen capitulating to the DRM lawyers, they lose credibility within their community - and that is hard to get back. If they do go down because of this, they maintain credibility on the street that will be with them long after Digg. Their company values are being tested in a very public way.

Also, I think this could be an interesting lesson for online communities in general. If Digg "loses", it will be at the hands of the community itself. By forcing the company's hand, the users could be insuring their own community's demise. Maybe they are prepared for that, but I always abide by the adage: "don't sh*t where ya eat" and it looks like this DRM code issue could spoil all the things that the Digg community has worked so hard to create - just to make a point. Is it worth it to them? Do they realize that this could be the case? Who knows.